by MadMaxAU
Saul noticed Quiverian’s mouth purse in disapproval. To have Percells in charge of the recovery operation was obviously hard for the man to bear. But he was here on sufferance, and could hardly complain.
By rights Carl could have kept the man away, in retaliation for the mutiny he had led down south. Even though Quiverian had disclaimed any responsibility for the renegades who had attacked the equatorial launchers—had denounced them publicly—he and his Arcists were hardly trusted. As long as they were in Central they were watched constantly by a tem of Keoki Anuenue’s neural and adopted Hawaiians.
Still, with the negotiating power the contents of the Care Package were about to give him, Carl could afford to be generous.
No one was even certain what the thing contained. Saul pondered. I could list a thousand items I’d give a finger or a bicuspid for, or more. And there are hundreds of other lists, each as long as mine.
Alas, there probably isn’t even an ounce of good pipe tobacco aboard.
He smiled in faint irony. I’ll settle for the cell differentiation tuner in that cloning system they developed on Earth ten years ago.
It had started logically enough, his program with monkeys and gibbons and subtly altered strains of wheat . . . searching for new elements to add to a growing synergism— a meshing of Earthborn and Halleyform life to take the place of perpetual war. But in recent months it had become something more complicated. There were aspects, now, that he was certain Carl Osborn would not approve, and that Virginia probably would never understand.
That was why he had moved his laboratory down into a secret chamber under a quadrant of Halley far from rockets and clans, and prevented even Virginia’s bodyguard mechs from following him there. It had contributed to the growing breach between them, but he had paid that price.
It had been months since he last connected with her the way they had grown accustomed, meshing their emotions— and even an occasional, machine amplified thought— while holding each other under the faint glow of JonVon’s status lamps. He had not dared For she would surely catch traces . . . suspect the liberties he had taken, and their tragic results.
A squirming, horrible little thing in a glass incubator . . . gills and fur and swishing tail . . . a face — faintly human— contorted in agony and then, mercifully still at last . . .
“It’s a beauty,” Carl Osborn whispered. And Saul blinked, shaking himself back to the present. It was a memory he preferred not to dwell on, anyway. He looked up to see the faery craft now clearly depicted on the screens.
Spires as wispy as spider’s silk spread like the winter-bared stems of a flower—the spinnerets from which great sails had billowed during the cargo vessel’s three swooping sun-passes—arrayed round a globe that shimmered with impossible mirror brightness.
“I’m scanning that container capsule in the center,” Lani Nguyen said from the instrumentation console. “I’d wondered how they dealt with dust impacts at those speeds. It looks like their shield isn’t even material at all! It’s some sort of gravitic field, or I’m my own maiden aunt.”
“No!” Carroll muttered, and shared a glance with Carl. “A real force field? No wonder they were able to build it so light.”
Otis Sergeov, leader of the Ubermensch party of Percells, hung from the edge of a holistank to the left, with several of his tattooed comrades. “The purple zippered thingy’s still too meppeed light. What good will two tons of Earth shit do anyway?”
Jeffers laughed. “What would I do for a few pounds of the right machine dies, or a mile or two of warm superconducting wire? Hell, for those I’d even be willing to paint my skin blue and gibber NewTalk like an Uber, Otis.”
Sergeov’s eyes glinted, and Saul knew that being a fellow Percell would not save Jeffers, if the legless ex Russian ever had the other man’s fate in his hands.
“Bezmoodiy govnocheest!” he muttered in his native tongue. Jeffers only laughed.
Susan Ikeda, their Earthcomm chief, reported on the latest word over the long range radio.
“Earth Control says their four hour estimate is on target. Probe is in the proper deceleration track.”
“Can’t be,” Carroll muttered.
“But they say . . .”
“Their info is four hours old! Speed o’ light, I tell you. Something’s—“
“Can it, Andy,” Carl said. For a time there was quiet in the room. Only the soft hum of the air fans and faint clicking each time somebody threw a switch. Then Lani spoke.
“It’s turning its torch, Virginia.”
“Check. About time. I’m extending the tether.”
Virginia betrayed no sign of tension, but those in the room hung in suspense. The overhead displays showed the colonists’ two-piece envoy craft, the parts connected by a taut cable less than a finger’s width in thickness and more than fifty kilometers long. Rockets flared, and the connected body began to whirl, like a slow, great bola in the starry blackness.
“Section B’s propellant now depleted,” Andy Carroll announced. “Section A is ready to receive transferred momentum in three hundred ten seconds.”
Lani turned and explained to those observing, “Our probe was a two-stage rocket. Part B provided the initial boost. Part A has saved its fuel for the final match with the Care Package.”
“Then why is part B still attached?” one of Quiverian’s people asked.
Lani moved her two fists around each other, imitating a bola. “We’re using a whirling tether to steal even more momentum from the booster stage. By flinging part B back toward Halley, we give its share of energy to the other piece, our envoy.”
The onlookers barely listened. All eyes were on the center screen, where the Care Package began to turn. What had been a hot speck at the edge of the mirror dome brightened as it swung around to face the colonists’ spinning, two piece messenger.
The image was too blurred. Their cameras aboard the swiftly rotating section A could not keep a steady bearing on the Earth ship. Processing the quick glimpses, JonVon could barely keep up a simulated point of view.
Saul wondered if he should be helping. He knew JonVon better than did anyone but Virginia herself. At least he could help the organic computer steady the image.
But he had not offered. Frankly, he was afraid Virginia might refuse, and so make explicit what had already become tacit them.
I miss her so. I’ve wronged her by staying away . . . by not confessing whatI1 have done ....
So he had told himself over and over again. But that had not helped him find the courage to tell her of that little warped thing, growing in the clone tank in his secret lab, an attempt at a gift for her . . . but which had turned out, instead, to be a cruel reminder that God sets limits even on the powers given prophets, and enforces those boundaries severely.
I have been given, into my hands, the power to craft animals and even men . . . but am denied any way to give the woman I love the child she so desperately wants— a thing most men take for granted.
There had to be a reason. But as yet, the Infinite had not deigned to confide it to him.
“What the unholy clape is the thing tryin’ to do?” Saul heard Jeffers mutter.
“I think…” Carl Osborn glided a step forward, his voice suddenly stark. “I think it’s trying to hit our probe.”
“Impossible!” one of the Ortho moderates from Almondstone Cavern cried. “Why would it . . .”
But the fierce lance of the Earth craft’s drive suddenly flared in brilliance as its aspect came nearer the camera’s view. Andy Carroll cried out, “Maneuvering! Accelerating turn!” And then all was chaos.
“Tether separated!” Lani shouted.
“I’ve lost contact with section B!” another spacer called out.
“Keep back, all of you! Let them work. Give them room!” Carl cursed as he pushed people away from the controllers. Above their heads the screens were a blur of overloaded sensors.
Carl’s eyes met his as Saul edged past the shouting crowd, wo
rming between the locked arms of Anuenue’s Hawaiians to approach the consoles. There was a silent flicker of emotion on Osborn’s face, then the spacer jerked his head. “All right,” he told Saul. “Help them. But if you get in their way, I’ll have your ass.”
Saul nodded and jumped forward to land lightly on the webbing beside Virginia. He pulled a neural helmet from the console and put it over well rubbed spots on his skull.
The maelstrom was even worse down in the realm of images and data streams. Without years of practice under Virginia’s tutelage, he would have been instantly lost in the noise.
He sifted, looking only for the vision processing centers. The really important stuff— vectors and mechanical status reports and course data— he did not even touch. Probably, he would do more harm than good if he tried to help there. But he could give Carl and the others a better view of what was happening. That much was within his ability, he figured.
He called up the section of JonVon’s memory that was reserved for his own work, reciting his secret access code.
Simon says, open Kelley.
The response actually seemed to take a few milliseconds, showing how busy the processor was.
Good afternoon, Dr. Lintz. I have news to report on the state of the newest experiments. The clone chambers are operating nominally. There is—
Not now, he interrupted. Override all but basic life-function maintenance. Transfer other resources to processing incoming data into clear images and displaying them according to following formats.
He to envisioned the console before him, and “dived” in with his mind, tracing pathways and naming throbbing electronic blocks for JonVon to access. The data streams were almost total chaos to him, but working with JonVon seemed to open up possibilities. It gave him a glimpse— or so he often thought— at the wonders Virginia dealt in, as surrogates for the share of infinity that could never be hers.
Bad topic. Concentrate, you old fool!
The seared, tumbling cameras on probe A were still transmitting. If only he and JonVon could time and phase the tumble . . . access the probe and have it send views in quick pulses . . . .
Yes! Clever machine. Mama taught you well.
Gradually, over the course of seconds, the blur resolved, flickered, steadied. He saw that the fiery torch of the Earth ship had been left behind, its flare no longer burning bright.
The breaking tether took it by surprise. He realized that the Earth vessel had not been able to track pieces flying in such suddenly altered directions. One of the sections was now streaking toward the Care Package at an oblique angle, even faster than before.
“It was only trying to defend itself!” someone cried out in the audience. “We must’ve activated a meteoroid defense!”
Another observer agreed. “We have to terminate this stupid interference. Let it come in as its designers planned. Anything we to will be like savages interfering in a complex machine they don’t understand. It’ll only bring disaster!”
There was a rumble of agreement, but Saul could sense, beyond current after current of settling data, the distinctive flavor of triumph from Virginia.
“Got you!” he heard her whisper, from not far away. Briefly, he turned his head and tried to look at her. But the pulsing neural tap and his natural vision system clashed, threatening him with a wave of vertigo. He closed his eyes again and concentrated on stabilizing the image for Carl.
“That’s it,” he heard the spacer mutter behind him. “Easy goes it, Andy, Virginia . . . try to lock gently at the base of those spinnerets. Then, Lani, help Virginia tap into the thing’s computer. Find out why it hasn’t initiated contact yet.”
“Aye, Carl,” Lani answered. Saul sensed the Earth vessel as a looming image of burnished gold and silver…a globe too mirror smooth to be any substance at all. In that surface a tiny shape wavered and grew, brightening now and then s the colonists’ robot puffed and flared to match velocities. Their little envoy was dwarfed against the curve of reflected starglow, a spindly crudity that dared to reach out and touch angelic beauty.
“Contact! We’re locked onto a spinneret,” Carroll announced.
“Pulsing a probe to probe communications code,” Lani reported. “We’ll see what it has to say— “
Then Virginia wailed.
“Those mad sons of bitches!”
It was as if a knife blade had come down and sliced off one of Saul’s hands. A tsunami of noise and pain tore at his moorings like a hurricane, yanking shreds of himself away into a storm of wild data. It felt like drowning, and he had no idea where up was, anymore. The hurt and chaos was overwhelming.
One thing happened then, that saved Saul’s mind. He sneezed.
The jerking explosion was so violent that the neural tap helmet flew off his head and banged into the console. Suddenly the world was light and air and real noise— a tumult of human voices that seemed, in comparison, like the whispering of a morning breeze.
“What happened—“
“—blew up! —“
“My God, pure annihilation...!”
“Itaka, get on alert channel! Tell the surface crews to take cover at once!” Carl’s voice commanded above the panicked ferment. “Get them below before the neutrons hit!”
Hands pulled at Saul’s shoulders, attempting to drag him back. He blinked through spots and saw Andy Carroll’s limp form being cut free of his webbing. Keoki Anuenue was fumbling at the back of Virginia’s lolling neck, tugging at her neural tap while others hurried up bearing stretchers.
“No!” Saul screamed. He grabbed Keoki’s wrist so hard that the big Hawaiian gasped in surprise.
Saul croaked, “Don’t let anyone touch her. Nobody!” He picked up the helmet he had just thrown off. “Leave her alone!” Trembling, he put it back on.
In an instant he was back down under the roiling, churning tide of electrons, the roar of an explosion large enough to break a small world.
Better prepared, this time, Saul rode the surges, seeking a rock, an eddy, anywhere to stand and gather threads.
A piece of JonVon’s personality-mimicry program hurtled by, murmuring something about refusing an “Academy Award”…whatever that was. He grabbed it and linked the fragment to sub-routine for searching library data bases, and another containing information on stock raising on the Isle of Wight.
“Virginia,” he whispered. “Where are you?”
What instinct had told him, with deeper certainty than mere knowledge, that she was lost somewhere in this maelstrom. . . ? That to disconnect her would be to leave her— if not a vegetable— then with something basic lost forever to chaos? Saul cast about, gathering a ragged construct, a troop of bits and flotsam, and sent scouts out, searching.
A whisper of tropical air, over there!
A scent of chrysanthemum blossoms, here!
A secret memory from childhood . . . of embarrassment with a neighbor boy . . . bring it in.
Traces, all, precipitating out of a whirling jumble. One by one, it would have taken a thousand lifetimes to recognize and even stack them all, let alone sort them into what they had been. He didn’t try. All he could do was love them.
Fear and pain . . . a whispered curse.
“. . . those mad sons of b . . .”
It hurtled past. But Saul reached out after it.
I love you, Virginia, he called. Blemishes and all . . . Stupid and blind as I am. I love you, and I’ll love you forever . . . .
. . . forever . . .
The word echoed .
. . . forever. . . ?
Yes. Down time until even the Hot fades and all ice comes alive . . . l will never leave you ....
. . . never. . . ?
Oh . . . Saul . . .
Oh...
“Oooh,” her real-world voice sighed beside him. “Oh, Saul…” The webbing vibrated with movement and suddenly her hand was gripping his, so hard that the welcome pin added to the free flow of tears in his eyes.
CARL
C
arl gritted his teeth in irritation, but didn’t let it show. Four hours had passed since the explosion. The searing heat from the nearby blast had flash vaporized a layer of ice off one face of Halley. There had been extensive damage to mechs and diagnostic instruments on the surface, and some casualties. Data was slow coming in, but that hadn’t stopped people from jabbering and theorizing.
Joao Quiverian was getting insufferable. He used the full impact of his height, towering over the others, his voice ringing with a hollow, magisterial command.
“We have erred in a way I find unfathomable. This mishap is a direct result of our meddling with what we do not understand,
rather than placing our trust in our fellow human beings. Obviously the mech somehow ignited the fusion chamber of—“
“Perdeeyn!” Sergeov swore. “Arcist idiot— “
Quiverian bore on. “— the Care Package. and—“
“Okay, that’s enough,” Carl said sharply. “Shut up, everybody!”
The knot of people turned its attention to him. “Look at these numbers.” He gestured at one of the screens. “That was a full thermonuclear blast. Not a malfunction of the fusion drive.”
Quiverian gaped. “Not . . . But why would they send to us...”
Sergeov’s blue tattooed skin creased with a bitter smile. “Not to us— for us.”
Carl nodded. “I think so.”
“A . . . bomb?” Lani Nguyen asked wonderingly, her almond eyes widening at the thought.
Carl said flatly, “JonVon estimates the yield at several hundred megatons. Plenty of neutrons, gammas— the works. No fusion chamber I ever heard of can go off with anything like that yield.”
Quiverian said slowly, “Then they intended…to…”
“Have us take that package into our ice and then blow it up. Shatter everything inside Halley. Melt away the top kilometer, cave in the shafts everywhere else.” Carl had to control his jittering nervous energy. Back home, in gravity, the muscles were always doing some work just to remain standing, burning away minute tensions. Here, inner demands for action found no expression. You had to focus it all into other avenues voice, expression, gesture.